Thursday, December 8, 2011

Shattered Windows

Numerous times over the last few years, viruses and malware have attacked our family Windows PCs. We've fought back, and spent days taking back our computers. But each time we lost a bit more faith in Microsoft products.

We have five active computers in the house. The last one running Windows was shut down last week. And it's all because of the Swiss cheese operating system.

My son was the first to make the leap. He chose the path of Red Hat Linux. That was several years ago when running Linux was still difficult. He's a bit of a computer geek and adapted. Soon, he was hacking his way across the Net and into the neighbor's routers.

The next two computers giving up on Windows were both mine. I'd battled with the Windows XP Antispyware 2010 and 2011 too many times. When my desktop unit was completely befuddled, I bought a new laptop, then installed Ubuntu on both of them.

A few weeks later, my middle daughter was attacked by Windows XP Antispyware 2011. She too gave up on Windows. She's had enough. The middle child chose a Macintosh and hasn't looked back.

About 2 weeks ago, my youngest, who thought she was safe with Windows 7 was fried by the Win 7 Antispyware 2012. We spent a night killing off that nasty bit of malware. She fumed for another day, then went and bought herself a Mac.

So, we're a family finally free of Windows PCs - Yea!

Except at work, where the computer techs just spent the better half of the morning battling yet another piece of crap that had infiltrated Windows Outlook.

4 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Excellent blog! Do you have any helpful hints for aspiring writers? I'm planning to start my own site soon but I'm a little lost on everything. Would you suggest starting with a free platform like Wordpress or go for a paid option? There are so many choices out there that I'm completely overwhelmed .. Any recommendations? Many thanks!

As an aspiring writer, you know that free or cheap is the best way to go. I would build a paid blog at this point, though I've had them in the past. Hell, I've even had my own server. But that's a story for another day.

I have a WordPress blog, but rarely post there. Likewise, I have a Tumblr - sweet blog for the young and young at hear. I also use Blogger.

Of all of them, I like the Blogger best. It's not much on options, but if you want to get the word out, Blogger is the easiest to use. Sign up for an account and you're ready to post.

Feel free to email me if you have questions. My email address is on the blog.

When I was a kid I loved the classic vampire stories. As I grew up the stories changed until these days, they’re all about eternal love and how best to woo the heart of a teenage goth chick. Or, as Diana Trees puts it, they’re sparkly. In short, I have come to hate the vampire novel with a passion that rivals the depths of the emo self-pity felt by the average character in said books.

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The only problem I had with the book, if you can call it a problem, is how difficult it was for me to establish a rapport with the main character. After all, the main character is a vampire in a more traditional sense. She thinks and feels but she doesn’t pine away for some long lost love who has just been reborn into his or her great great great grandson’s body. The main character feels alien and vicious – and rightly so. Near the end I saw a bigger glimpse into her personal life that opened her up some. It was a good thing that showed character development. It made her feel a little more human without reducing her to glitter and sparkles.

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The paranormal erotica and romance genres have bloomed in recent years, and as anyone will tell you, much of the fare offered up is... well, pretty bland. The werewolves are emo, the vampires sparkle, everyone has flowing tresses and wears a lot of lace. Then comes along Diana Trees with 'Divine Wine', and - joy of joys! - the genre is as it should be. 'This little book is a racy, edgy, gritty grindhouse story, packed with intriguing characters and sexy monsters.

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“Divine Wine” by Diana Trees is a fun story for readers that can handle the anti-hero concept with violence taken so far it becomes comical. The lead character seeks out violent criminals and places them in a nightmarish situation with every bit of inhumanity, brutality, and beyond what they gave to their victims. This “Evil meets Evil-er” story, not for the faint of heart, gets the reader laughing as the outrageous creatures have their own agenda outside of human society and are more than happy to bring in new criminals to satisfy their need for entertainment. Congratulations, four stars!